Review: 2015 Iveco Daily

David Meredith heads to Milan, Italy, to sample the next major revision of Iveco's Daily light commercial vehicle

The Australian management of Iveco’s local arm is planning a major market push over the next 12 months, starting with the new model Daily van and cab/chassis range, launched to dealers and journalists in Milan last week.

The dealers will be relieved. In recent years Iveco's presence in the Australian media has rarely adopted a lower profile…

In reality, the way to address this issue is already staring Iveco in the face. The entrenched Iveco Acco is probably the most heavily developed truck in Australia, and is made – or largely assembled – at the company’s under-utilised plant in Dandenong, in Melbourne's eastern suburbs.

My discussions with the facility's technical people shows how closely this product is 'plugged in' to the waste collection industry in Australia, where costs are identified per bin collected, and trucks are locked into one of the most punishing schedules on the road. Other brands have tried to match the Acco's specs, but most fall short or demand some amount of compromise on the part of their operators.

The new Daily will present the company with a similar opportunity to offer a completely unique vehicle to the marketplace. Because, unlike its competitors, every Daily, from the smallest van to the largest tray top, has a variable C-section full length chassis with tubular cross-members underneath its sleek new skin. The various bodies are therefore mounted on a frame, rather than the conventional unitary construction.

The engineering surrounding this new product is impressive, with hundreds of millions of Euros spent on design, research, development and production plant upgrades to handle the volumes and option diversity the range offers.

Daily has been on the market since 1975. There have been eight re-styling exercises and constant upgrades during the span of the 1.2 million vehicles produced to date. In 1999 it was the first light commercial vehicle to have common-rail injection. This is the third generation and 80 per cent of the parts are completely new. Australian boss Stavros Yallouridis was quick to emphasise the Daily was more a light truck than a van derivative.

The new model offers GVMs of between 2.8 to 7 tonnes, 13 body versions in 280 different sizes, two engines with 12 engine settings, five gearboxes, two front suspensions, four rear suspensions, 11 wheelbases, and three internal heights.

Approximately 35 per cent of the factory output concerns vans and buses. All the rest are configured in cab/chassis and crew cab versions.

The development of the new model has been characterised by new engineering, new suspensions and a longer wheelbase, all measures that were focused on driver comfort and load efficiency.

The development engineers were tasked with keeping three parameters at the forefront. Firstly, the driver – in particular the aspects of comfort, access and safety. Secondly, the engineering – weight saving but increased strength, along with outstanding performance dynamics. And thirdly, the load – how to more efficiently package the load space for maximum versatility.

Additionally, the new design allows for the installation of CNG (Compressed Natural Gas) tanks, and hybrid battery packs with no impact on load space.

All Dailys are rear-wheel drive, and the engine list tops out at an impressive 151kW and 470Nm of torque. Completely new architecture brings greater body strength with weight savings, and the new suspension provides, among other things, a tight 10.5-metre turning circle for the short-wheelbase van.

The handling has changed completely due to the longer wheelbase and provides greater stability on broken roads and in crosswinds.

The new Quad-Leaf independent front suspension plays a major role in a bringing a passenger car feel to this light truck, with very precise steering, a stable wide-track stance and a 0.74g lateral acceleration limit.

The new rear suspension drops the cargo floor by 55mm, lowering the centre of gravity. There is a big improvement in noise reduction – I drove an old model around the test track and it boomed inside at the legal limit. Nothing like that in the new model.

The king of the Daily vans is the biggest area of enclosed sheet steel on the road, a whopping 19.6 cubic metres – twice as much as a 'normal' van.

The standard van occupies the same area of the road but now has nearly 11 cubic metres of load space.

A great option is the 'Eco' button on the dash, which allows a driver to change the torque settings of the engine at the end of a delivery run. With a bit of education, as drivers complete most of their deliveries, Iveco says selecting the Eco button can save up to 14 per cent in fuel for the unladen return leg.

As an additional security measure, the fuel filler is next to the passenger’s door, and the flap is secured when the door is closed.

I drove several models around the Ferrari, Maserati and Alfa Romeo test track at Balocca near Milan. Maybe it was my vivid imagination running away with me, but the Daily sat flat through the corners, moved the instant I shifted the steering wheel and went exactly where I pointed it. Absolutely nothing like a light truck.

I would suspect that many operators who only look at cab-over Japanese light trucks would change their ideas after spending a few kilometers in the Daily, particularly if they’re doing frequent delivery drops. Sitting behind the front wheels in a cab where there is an engine, front suspension and chassis sections between you and the accident is pretty reassuring, apart from the way the vehicle drives.

But in addition to engineering excellent road manners, the designers have taken a clean sheet of paper to the interior. There is lashings of storage space. The entire dash cover opens up with useful places for docket books, trip reports and log books etc. The air outlets have chrome surrounds – small point; big difference. A smaller steering wheel and 40 per cent more glass helps supplant the truck feel with the appearance and ambience of a well-equipped passenger car. Current big fleets will enjoy strong driver approval of the new model.

Tesco is one of the UK’s largest supermarket chains and it runs a fleet of 4000 vans for its home delivery arm. Around 3000 of them are Iveco Dailys. The boss of the organisation said it had started buying Dailys in 2008, and the fleet clocks up over 144 million kilometres a year. An important part of the support of Daily is the availability of CNG engines, and the fact that the chassis is the lightest on the market. The rear-wheel drive is more durable and the AMT transmission provides good fuel economy, plus the company enjoys big savings from body-fitting continuity.

The new model includes all the electrical architecture to allow connectivity with Iveconnect Fleet, the in-house telematics system for fleet managers.

Telematics is moving deeper into vehicle specifications and Daily’s Iveconnect provides fleet management and driver style evaluation to optimise fleet operations.

The driver-style system in particular has been proven to deliver fuel economy improvements of between five and 12 per cent. Testing shows that a 10 per cent increase in the driver style score results in a five per cent fuel saving.

Iveco Advanced Technology provides CNG options for all its product lines. Iveco and the Fiat Powertrains group are the 100 per cent owners of the Natural Power Technology used in these systems.

The new Iveco Daily will be in showrooms early in the New Year. It’s a testament to the rugged dependability of the brand name that the current model is still being successfully sold, even though the news of the new model is well publicised.

The factory can only hope that the dealer network is up to the task of expanding Daily market penetration dramatically with this new model.

2015 IVECO DAILY SPECIFICATIONS

ENGINES: 2.3-litre and 3-litre four cylinder turbo diesel

POWER: 78, 93 and 107kW; 100, 107, 125 and 151kW

TORQUE: 270, 320 and 350Nm; 350, 400, 430 and 470Nm

EMISSIONS: Euro 5b+ and Euro 6

STD TRANSMISSION: Six-speed manual

OPT TRANSMISSION: TBA

CONFIGURATION: Front engine, rear-wheel drive

GVM: 3.3 to 7 tonnes

WHEELBASE: 3000mm to 4750mm

PRICING: TBA

WEB: www.iveco.com.au

Review: 2015 Iveco Daily

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